Social Good

Body positivity isn't enough. This book will teach you 'radical' self-love.

Sonya Renee Taylor, an activist and poet who identifies as fat, black, and queer, refuses to apologize for her body.

But she doesn't want you to mistake her defiance for an abundance of self-esteem or self-confidence. Nor is it solely about body positivity, a movement that has empowered countless people but one that Taylor believes falls short of offering true liberation for everyone.

The slim volume is a memoir of awakening. It's also a handbook for how to free yourself — and others — from the oppression of living in a body that's terrorized or made invisible by stereotype, judgment, discrimination, and, yes, public policy.

"Radical self-love invites us to love our bodies in a way that transforms how we understand and accept the bodies of others," Taylor writes.

So radical self-love isn't about getting to the place where you can finally like your thighs; it's the process of realizing that most of us subscribe to what Taylor calls a "hierarchy of bodies." We gauge our own self-worth and value based on how we fit into that pecking order, and in turn, we tend to exalt (or resent) those above us and shame (or torment) those below us.

"Radical self-love invites us to love our bodies in a way that transforms how we understand and accept the bodies of others."

When Taylor joyfully walks me through this philosophy over the phone, I'm surprised to hear a skeptical voice in my head justifying the hierarchy I should loathe. Most people want to belong, and the scale, however twisted, gives us direction and incentive to shape our physical appearance according to cultural norms. And we'll often be rewarded for our efforts in the form of compliments, admiration, and acceptance.

Of course, this is an easy way to see the world when you aren't at war with your own body, have no desire to attack other people's bodies, and aren't bullied and harassed by others. Taylor also reassures me that a defensive response makes sense given what we've been taught about our bodies since childhood.

"If every body is OK, then what do I do to define my self-worth?" she asks rhetorically. In other words, when we embrace radical self-love and reject judgment of ourselves and others, it means abandoning a worldview that, for better or worse, has taught us exactly when and how we're worthy of respect, praise, and affection.

That's why spurning the hierarchy of bodies in pursuit of something more just and loving leaves us with a prospect that is both terrifying and thrilling: "our own divine enoughness, absent of any need for comparison."

That need to pit one body against another, Taylor argues, doesn't just affect a person's relationship with their own body; it can seep into their everyday interactions with people — and shape their political choices.

One recurrent theme in the Obamacare debate, for example, has been the conservative argument that some bodies are somehow less deserving of access to healthcare. That notion targeted fat bodies for scorn and exclusion simply because of how much they weigh. While the average person might not see the connection between their personal expectations of thinness, how they treat larger bodies in private and public, and who they'd vote for in an election, Taylor wants you to know these things can all be linked.

"When folks are living in body shame and body hatred, that impacts the world," she tells me.

By now you understand that the type of "body acceptance" Taylor envisions isn't the kind you'll regularly find in corporate advertising campaigns or glossy fashion and health magazines. If it's not shifting power or resources to the most marginalized people among us, she tells me, then it won't change anything.

What she hopes for is an awakening that actually changes what we expect from our political, economic, and social systems so that people aren't cruelly punished based on where they land in the hierarchy.

As Taylor points out in her book, an obsession with shaming and ranking bodies has led to violence ("body terrorism") against countless people throughout history: Africans who were enslaved, slaves and black people who were lynched, Jews (and non-Jews) who were sent to concentration camps, Japanese-Americans who were interned, and people with disabilities who were involuntarily sterilized.

Such acts of political and physical violence aren't relics of a less-enlightened past, either. Same-sex couples were only granted the right to marry in every U.S. state a few years ago, and LGBTQ people continue to face workplace discrimination and harassment. Deadly police violence disproportionately affects black communities. Transgender children no longer have the Department of Education on their side when it comes to accessing bathrooms at school.

Taylor makes the compelling argument that such injustices are ultimately about whose bodies supposedly belong — and whose don't.

This is why she's skeptical of the popular concept of body positivity, which was born out of the fat acceptance movement. As people outside of that movement and companies adopted, appropriated, and marketed the idea, body positivity increasingly became a narrow shorthand for self-love.

"When we limit body positivity to the self, and our own challenges, we cut out how our bodies are connected to systems and institutions," Taylor writes.

Some people will inevitably dismiss Taylor's vision of radical self-love. They'll insist that bodies tell a story about people's willingness to take responsibility for their choices. They'll argue that people have a duty to stay fit, and if they're not able-bodied, it's their job to overcome obstacles to success. They might even suggest that the way our bodies reflect race and ethnicity is a non-issue and talking about related discrimination is playing the victim card.

In other words, Taylor's prescription of radical self-love is unlikely to convince those who believe in "bootstrapping" their way through life. But it might just move someone who struggles to feel good about their body, knows from experience that throwing themselves wholly into self-esteem building doesn't always work, and wants to make the world a safer place for all bodies.

"If you find yourself thinking only about you, disconnected from other people, you're not on a radical self-love journey."

If that sounds familiar, you're probably wondering what to do next. While Taylor's book can feel abstract and sometimes muddled, she wants to make it clear that radical self-love isn't a far-off state for which we're always searching. She believes that it's within us all, buried deep beneath the layers of shame that accumulate over time.

The process of peeling those layers away begins with three steps: making peace with not understanding other people's experiences; making peace with the difference of each body you encounter; and making peace with your body. She urges readers to constantly identify, and be curious about, what our ideas of physical perfection mean for others.

"This is not a solo journey," she tells me. "If you find yourself thinking only about you, disconnected from other people, you’re not on a radical self-love journey."

The book includes detailed tips on how to build "shame-free, inclusive communities," and how to have difficult conversations about whose voices are most heard and whose are not. While Taylor provides guidelines and best practices, she understands that mistakes are also part of the process. The trick to continuing the journey, she says, means quieting the impulse to quit after a misstep, or to become defensive and withdraw.

"It means we apologize and try again," she writes, "holding fast to our intention to connect with other humans in different bodies from a place of compassion and shared humanity."

Taylor's passion for complexity is contagious. After all, there's something lonely about wrestling in isolation with the disappointment we feel in our own bodies and the judgment we cast on others. It's even harder to try emerging from that darkness, relying only on the gospel of self-confidence and self-acceptance.

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